Harold Gournay was born in Eunice, Louisiana in 1919. He grew up and attended school in Eunice. He graduated from high school in 1938. Gournay had one brother and one sister. He lived through the Depression. From 1935, he lived with his grandparents. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, Gournay was in basic training in Jefferson Barracks, Missouri. He had enlisted in the Army Air Forces but was initially in training for the field artillery. He started his basic training at Camp Shelby [Annotator's Note: Camp Shelby is near Hattiesburg, Mississippi] where he was assigned to field artillery. He was pushing cannons up and down the hills in Mississippi. Gournay told his sergeant that no matter how much they pushed the artillery, it would not fly. Not understanding his meaning, the sergeant questioned Gournay for an explanation. At that point, Gournay reminded the sergeant that he had enlisted in the Air Force. In a matter of days, Gournay was sent to Jefferson Barracks. He applied for the air cadets since he already had a civilian pilot license. After passing basic training in California, he went into flight training, but the way he flew was not acceptable and he washed out [Annotator's Note: washed out means that he did not succeed in his training]. Next, Gournay went to Armament School. He completed that training and insisted that he did not want to merely load the weapons, he wanted to shoot them. He then attended Aerial Gunnery School and completed that training. He was assigned to a B-17 crew. [Annotator’s Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber]. Gournay completed his training in Savannah [Annotator’s Note: Savannah, Georgia]. He then flew to New Hampshire which was followed by a flight to Newfoundland. From that point, he flew on to the Azores and then to Marrakesh, North Africa. From Marrakesh, he flew to Tunis, Tunisia. From Tunis, he flew to Sicily where the American troops were making progress in their advances. He ended his transfer with his arrival at his main base in Foggia, Italy. Foggia is in the southern part of Italy near the Adriatic Sea.

Harold Gournay flew out of Italy for 18 or 19 missions [Annotator's Note: Gournay served in the USAAF as a waist gunner on Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bombers in the 353rd Bombardment Squadron, 301st Bombardment Group, 15th Air Force based in Foggia, Italy]. Gournay flew over Austria, Germany, Northern Italy, Southern France, and Ploesti, Rumania. The bombing targets were ball bearing factories in Austria and oilfields in Ploesti as well as bridges and railroad terminals. He always flew the B-17 bomber as a waist gunner. Gournay loved the B-17. He rejected the idea of flying in a B-24 bomber. [Annotator’s Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber]. Gournay experienced enemy antiaircraft fire. There were holes in the plane when they returned from missions. Ploesti was the most difficult raid because of the heavy enemy fire. The sky was black and gray as a result of all the antiaircraft fire. Gournay was shot down on his 22nd mission. He had been converted to a bombardier on his 19th mission. He was given about 30 minutes of training with a board with buttons on it. When he was on a mission, he sat in the nose of the plane where the bombardier sat. He flew four missions like that. When he was sent over a railroad terminal target in Maribor, Yugoslavia, the intent was to disrupt the flow of supplies to the Germans in Palermo in Northern Italy. His bomber was struck by enemy antiaircraft fire. He was with a new crew. Two experienced men were always sent up with new crews. He did not have a chance to get to know the new crewmen. When Gournay bailed out, he spotted four or five other chutes. He was being fired upon from the ground so, at first, he attempted to guide his parachute away from the incoming rounds. He ceased trying to evade the gunfire and landed backwards in the top of a tree. The Germans were soon under him and two climbed up the tree to cut him loose and capture him. Gournay was brought to a barn where the enemy troops were billeted.

Harold Gournay was captured by the Germans and taken by truck from Yugoslavia to Austria. [Annotator's Note: Gournay was a bombardier in a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber in the 353rd Bombardment Squadron, 301st Bombardment Group, 15th Air Force and was shot down over Yugoslavia on his 22nd mission and captured.] Although the truck carrying Gournay was headed to Austria, so many of the bridges were damaged and destroyed that the trip was rerouted through Czechoslovakia. After bailing out of his bomber, Gournay was injured in the landing. His arms and head had been injured with heavy bleeding from the head. It was painful. He was transferred to Nuremburg where he was interrogated by a German major. The major would slap Gournay before he answered a question because it was anticipated that Gournay would respond with a lie. After Nuremburg, Gournay was taken to Sagan, also called Zagan. The town was on what had been the Polish border before the Germans invaded and defeated Poland. There he was incarcerated in Stalag Luft III. Stalag Luft III was where the Great Escape had taken place prior to Gournay being captured. About 50 of the escaped POWs [Annotator’s Note: prisoner of war] were killed. Gournay was interrogated by the German Luftwaffe [Annotator’s Note: German air force]. The Germans insisted that Gournay remove his high school graduation ring. It would not come off his finger. The German pulled his bayonet and it helped the ring slip off quickly afterward. The Germans also took his watch and glasses, too. Three days before he was captured, Gournay had a cold and went to a hospital to be checked. He weighed 173 pounds at the time. While a POW, Gournay received three little potatoes a day and a bowl of what they called soup. In the first 100 days of his incarceration, he lost 100 pounds. As Russian forces advanced toward the camp, the prisoners were evacuated in January [Annotator's Note: January 1945]. The German guards generally did not treat Gournay badly although other POWs were handled roughly. When the POWs left Stalag Luft III, it was 17 degrees with three inches of snow on the ground. Gathering his meager belongings, he had a heavy overcoat to help protect him from the bitter cold. The POWs were lined up four abreast and told not to fall out of formation. There were several thousand POWs being moved. The prisoners were marched for a couple of weeks before being put in train cars. An eight horse car would take on 40 POWs for travel to Stalag Luft VII-A in Moosburg. Remaining there for a while, the camp was liberated by Patton's [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General George S. Patton] 3rd Army [Annotator's Note: Stalag VII-A was liberated on 29 April 1945 by the US 14th Armored Division]. From Moosburg, Gournay was taken to Camp Lucky Strike in Le Havre. The liberated POWs could eat 24 hours a day. After a two week stay, Gournay boarded a ship for Southampton, England. From there, the trip to New York took 11 days. There was plenty of food onboard the ship for the returning men. On arrival in America, Gournay went to Camp Kilmer in New Jersey. He weighed 65 pounds at that time. While he was a POW, there was a German civilian woman who provided him and other captives with water. She would pour water through the fence into cans the POWs held. The German guards discouraged that practice so the woman stopped helping the POWs. Although Gournay, along with eight others, received three parcels from the Red Cross, often times the cigarettes, chocolate, and sugar would be missing. The guards had taken those choice items. Nevertheless, the packages helped the POWs. The Germans would sometimes prepare sauerkraut for the captives and dump it on the ground. The POWs could get the food if they wanted to eat it. The prisoners were kept several hundred in a barracks. Gournay had five others in his room. Eventually, Gournay would meet up with some of his fellow crewmen. One of those individuals later lived in San Angelo, Texas. His name was Fred Campbell and he was a B-17 navigator. The two men were close and would visit each other after the war. While on the march from his first Stalag, there was little food for the POWs. During the march, Gournay would attempt to find a French POW who had been assigned to work on German farms. Since Gournay could speak French, he would ask the Frenchman for food. He often succeeded in getting food that way. On the march, the Germans would provide a loaf of bread to the POWs. The loaf was about the size of a football and weighed about seven or eight pounds. It was made of sawdust and leaves. It was called tree flowers but it was leaves. It was black bread. He received medical attention about three weeks after reaching Sagan. There were shrapnel fragments in his head. A doctor used a large electric magnet to withdraw the metal from Gournay's head. Gournay had to brace himself because the extraction hurt worse than when he was originally hit by the shrapnel. All the pieces were removed in that uncomfortable process except for one. That one piece was removed after Gournay returned home and was combing his hair. He could tell something was there so his wife took a magnifying glass and tweezers and removed the piece from his scalp. It was about the size of a flattened straight pin. It hurt quite a bit but the last piece was gone.

Harold Gournay left Camp Lucky Strike and stopped in Southampton, England en route to the United States. The trip was terrible because so many people were seasick. Gournay had to go topside on the ship because the smell down below was so bad. He was told to go back below and threatened with being shot. Gournay told the guard to go ahead and shoot him. Instead, he was allowed to stay topside in a compartment in the front end of the ship. That was where Gournay stayed for about four days. Food and water was brought to him by the guard. The trip back to New York from England took 11 days. When he arrived in New York, the Red Cross had set up tables on the dock with milk and donuts. Gournay took some of what was offered. It was delicious. When he was about to leave, the lady providing the refreshments asked for payment from Gournay. The returning POW had no money and told her so. She did not relent. A passing individual paid for the donuts and milk for Gournay. That experience left Gournay with a bad interpretation of the Red Cross. From New York, he was sent to Miami for rest and recuperation. He was getting in good shape and gaining weight. With the Japanese war still going on, he was asked to be a gunnery instructor. He did not want to do so. With that rejection of the instructor position, Gournay was told that he would be participating in the war with Japan. Within a short time, the war with Japan ended and Gournay was sent to Camp Shelby where he was discharged. He returned to Eunice, Louisiana and has remained in residence there. Gournay went to work in the oilfields for 46 years for the same company and then retired. It seems that youngsters today are interested in World War 2. His grandson made a model of a B-17 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber] for him. Gournay loved that airplane because of it resilience. It took heavy damage and often still managed to return its crew to safety. When he went on the raid over Ploesti, Romania, there were 100 planes sent in and only 17 returned. He was serving with the 301st Bomb Group. The raid over Ploesti was tough because of the heavy antiaircraft fire.